Sherlock Holmes | fictional character | Britannica.com fictional character The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes, fictional character created by the Scottish writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle . The prototype for the modern mastermind detective , Holmes first appeared in Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet, published in Beeton’s Christmas Annual of 1887. As the world’s first and only “consulting detective,” he pursued criminals throughout Victorian and Edwardian London , the south of England , and continental Europe. Although the fictional detective had been anticipated by Edgar Allan Poe ’s C. Auguste Dupin and Émile Gaboriau ’s Monsieur Lecoq, Holmes made a singular impact upon the popular imagination and has been the most enduring character of detective fiction. (See also Sherlock Holmes: Pioneer in Forensic Science .) Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes in one of several movies in which he played the detective created … The Granger Collection, New York Conan Doyle modeled Holmes’s methods and mannerisms on those of Dr. Joseph Bell, who had been his professor at the University of Edinburgh Medical School.

In particular, Holmes’s uncanny ability to gather evidence based upon his honed skills of observation and deductive reasoning paralleled Bell’s method of diagnosing a patient’s disease. Holmes offered some insight into his method, claiming that “When you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” His detecting abilities become clear, though no less amazing, when explained by his companion, Dr. John H. Watson , who recounts the criminal cases they jointly pursue. Although Holmes rebuffs praise, declaring his abilities to be “elementary,” the oft-quoted phrase “Elementary, my dear Watson,” never actually appears in Conan Doyle’s writings. Sherlock Holmes (right) explaining to Dr. Watson what he has deduced from a pipe left behind by a … Photos.com/Jupiterimages Watson’s narrations describe Holmes as a very complex and moody character who, although of strict habit, is considerably untidy. His London abode at 221B, Baker Street, is tended by his housekeeper, Mrs. Hudson. Holmes appears to undergo bouts of mania and depression, the latter of which are accompanied by pipe smoking, violin playing, and cocaine use.

Throughout the four novels and 56 short stories featuring Holmes, a number of characters recur, including the bumbling Scotland Yard inspector Lestrade ; the group of “street Arabs” known as the Baker Street Irregulars, who are routinely employed by Holmes as informers; his even wiser but less ambitious brother, Mycroft; and, most notably, his formidable opponent, Professor James Moriarty , whom Holmes considers the “Napoleon of crime.” Similar Topics Humpty Dumpty Claiming that Holmes distracted him “from better things,” Conan Doyle famously in 1893 ( The Final Problem) attempted to kill him off; during a violent struggle on Switzerland’s Reichenbach Falls , both Holmes and his nemesis , Professor Moriarty, are plunged over the edge of the precipice . Popular outcry against the demise of Holmes was great; men wore black mourning bands, the British royal family was distraught , and more than 20,000 readers cancelled their subscriptions to the popular Strand Magazine, in which Holmes regularly appeared. By popular demand, Conan Doyle resurrected his detective in the story The Adventure of the Empty House (1903). Holmes remained a popular figure into the 21st century.

Among the most popular stories in which he is featured are The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle (1892), The Adventure of the Speckled Band (1892), The Adventure of the Six Napoleons (1904), and the novel The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902). Holmes’s character has been translated to other media as well, and he is widely known on both stage and screen. The earliest actor to have essayed the role is William Gillette (a founding member of the New York Holmes society still known as the Baker Street Irregulars), who gave several popular theatrical portrayals at the turn of the 20th century. Those who have appeared as Holmes on-screen include Basil Rathbone , Peter Cushing , Jeremy Brett , Robert Downey, Jr. , and Benedict Cumberbatch . Ironically, two of the emblems of Holmes, his meerschaum pipe and deerstalker hat, are not original to Conan Doyle’s writings.

Gillette introduced the curved meerschaum pipe (it is thought to have been easier on the actor’s jaw during a long performance), and Sidney Paget the deerstalker (or “fore-and-aft”) cap—it was de rigueur for country living—in more than one illustration for The Strand of Holmes at work on his investigations in the country. Promotional poster for The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1939), starring … © 1939 Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation; photograph from a private collection Britannica Stories Big Radio Burst from Tiny Galaxy In addition to myriad translations of the Holmes adventures throughout the world, a genre of parodies and pastiches has developed based upon the Sherlock Holmes character. An entire collection of more scholarly “higher criticism” of Conan Doyle’s writings was initiated by Ronald Knox ’s “Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes” (1912). More recent higher criticism is epitomized by the work appearing in The Baker Street Journal (begun 1946), a quarterly publication of the Baker Street Irregulars. Holmes devotees, known as Sherlockians or Holmesians, frequently gather in societies around the world to pay tribute to the master detective with a cultist fervour.

The most established of these societies are the Baker Street Irregulars, founded in 1934, and the Sherlock Holmes Society of London, founded in 1951. The latter traces its origins to the Sherlock Holmes Society that was formed in London in 1934 and counted among its members the scholar and writer Dorothy L. Sayers ; it had ceased its activities by the 1940s. James Moriarty | Villains Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia Criminal / Mastermind “ He is a man of good birth and excellent education, endowed by nature with a phenomenal mathematical faculty. At the age of twenty-one he wrote A Treatise on the Binomial Theorem, which has had a European vogue. On the strength of it he won the mathematical chair at one of our smaller universities, and had, to all appearances, a most brilliant career before him. But the man had hereditary tendencies of the most diabolical kind. A criminal strain ran in his blood, which, instead of being modified, was increased and rendered infinitely more dangerous by his extraordinary mental powers. Dark rumors gathered round him in the University town, and eventually he was compelled to resign his chair and come down to London.

He is the Napoleon of Crime, Watson, the organizer of half that is evil and nearly all that is undetected in this great city... „ ~ Sherlock Holmes about Professor Moriarty in "The Final Problem". Professor James Moriarty is the archenemy of Sherlock Holmes and is often considered one of the first supervillains in fiction - he appeared in only two novels and despite rarely encountering Holmes personally he is considered the main antagonist of the entire Sherlock Holmes series, being famously described as the "Napoleon of Crime". Moriarty is widely considered to be the greatest fictional archenemy in fictional history. He has been portrayed by George Zucco (The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes), Jared Harris (A Game of Shadows) and most recently Andrew Scott (Sherlock). Contents History “ It seems a pity, but I have done what I could. I know every move of your game. You can do nothing before Monday. It has been a duel between you and me, Mr. Holmes. You hope to place me in the dock. I tell you that I will never stand in the dock. You hope to beat me. I tell you that you will never beat me.

If you are clever enough to bring destruction upon me, rest assured that I shall do as much to you. „ ~ Professor Moriarty in "The Final Problem". Professor Moriarty's past is vastly unknown and even the parts that are known are debatably untrue. He is noted to be of good birth and excellent education, and was a scientific and mathematical genius. He is introduced in the series as someone who is publicly worshiped for his accomplishments in science and technology, and is a mathematics professor at a famed university. It is explained in one particular adaption that he grew apart from his family because of his diabolical ambitions. He has at least one brother, a colonel also called James. Moriarty was eventually put into contact with several criminals in Britain and quickly realized that they lacked any organisation or precision, which - as a mathematical genius - he would be perfectly capable of reating with tactical magnificence. He was already renowned as extremely accomplished, having written works on the Binomial Theorem that have been internationally acclaimed. However, underneath his mask of benign and benevolent professorship at the university, he was in fact a cunning and formidable figure in the criminal underworld.

He operated as follows: he organised burglaries, heists, extortion and so forth on a regular basis, but with a certain sophistication that lacked brutality or unnecessary bloodthirst. If one of the people working for him was caught in their crimes, then Moriarty would anonymously place a substantial amount of money to pay for their defence in court. The money was not only to enable him to go free, but also to subtly order him not to expose the identity of his employer. Meeting Sherlock Holmes “ My dear Watson, I write these few lines through the courtesy of Mr. Moriarty, who awaits my convenience for the final discussion of those questions which lie between us. He has been giving me a sketch of the methods by which he avoided the English police and kept himself informed of our movements. They certainly confirm the very high opinion which I had formed of his abilities. I am pleased to think that I shall be able to free society from any further effects of his presence, though I fear that it is at a cost which will give pain to my friends, and especially, my dear Watson, to you.

I have already explained to you, however, that my career had in any case reached its crisis, and that no possible conclusion to it could be more congenial to me than this. Indeed, if I may make a full confession to you, I was quite convinced that the letter from Meiringen was a hoax, and I allowed you to depart on that errand under the persuasion that some development of this sort would follow. Tell Inspector Patterson that the papers which he needs to convict the gang are in pigeonhole M., done up in a blue envelope and inscribed "Moriarty." I made every disposition of my property before leaving England, and handed it to my brother Mycroft. Pray give my greetings to Mrs. Watson, and believe me to be, my dear fellow. Very sincerely yours, Sherlock Holmes „ ~ Sherlock's letter, predicting the results and consequences of him meeting Moriarty - his final farewell to Watson Professor Moriarty's incredible methods of organizing crime on such a great scale eventually attracted the attention of the detective Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock Holmes made a series of inquiries and personal missions into the investigation of Moriarty's gang.

He eventually succeeded in exposing certain high-ranking members of the gang to the police, provoking Moriarty to personally take matters into his own hands. He visited Sherlock Holmes at Baker Street, where they both established both of their respect for the other's intelligence and accomplishments. During this confrontation, Moriarty established that Sherlock's continuing investigations into Moriarty's operation has left Moriarty with no other alternative but to personally rain hell on the detective. He declared that, if he didn't cease to pursue Moriarty, Moriarty would destroy him in the worst possible way. Holmes - though being scared and extremely nervous around Moriarty - calmly refused to stop his investigation, rebuking Moriarty's threat by daring him to try and destroy him, and to reap the consequences that followed. Unable to persuade Holmes, Moriarty left. However, throughout the rest of the day, Moriarty made it abundantly clear that he was not to be trifled with at all. He organised three attempts on the detective's life: firstly, one of his men tried to drop a brick on Holmes's head, which missed by the breadth of a hair. Later on, another of his men tried to run him over with a speeding hansom.

Thirdly, Holmes arrived back at Baker Street only for a thug to ambush him with a bludgeon. Holmes overpowered the thug and arrested him, but Moriarty anonymously paid for his release as per his code of honor. These were not meant to kill him, as it turns out, but to intimidate him into relinquishing his investigation, which he did not. In an apparent attempt to flee from the ruthless megalomaniac, Holmes and Watson travelled to Switzerland for the week, specifically to Meirignen,the village residing next to the famous Reichenbach Falls (A colossal waterfall dropping into a frothing and violently churning whirlpool). Moriarty used the last remaining member of his gang - Sebastian Moran, the misanthropic expert marksman from the British Army - to hunt down Holmes and to manipulate people into diverting Watson out of the equation, leaving Moriarty to face Holmes himself. The two men met one final time on a ledge atop the Reichenbach Falls. Holmes took his time to write a farewell letter for Watson to find, expressing that he was about to confront Moriarty and that, one way or another, Holmes had rid the world of any terrible effects his gang may have had in the future.

He also sorrowfully expressed the belief that he would not survive the confrontation with Moriarty, and his excrutiating acknowledgement of how it would affect Watson. He later left the note along with his deerstalker for Watson to find, and turned to face Moriarty. The two men engaged in a climactic fight, in which they were both a painfully even match. However, lost in the intensity of the struggle, the two men fell from the precipice and plummeted down the Falls. The two men separated during the fall, and Sherlock survived when he hit the whirlpool. It is as yet unknown if Moriarty survived, but, him being Holmes's arch-nemesis, fans widely theorized that he had. Moriarty is mentioned but not seen in the novella The Valley of Fear, which is set before "The Final Problem." Here he is depicted as running a "criminal consulting agency," which liaises with various criminal organizations. Moriarty arranges the death of John Douglas, a former Pinkerton detective, as a favor for the Vermissa Valley Gang, a group of corrupt union officials who had been arrested by Douglas.

Moriarty's men killed Douglas in spite of Holmes's attempt to save him, an act which puts Holmes forever at odds with Moriarty. It's also depicted that he has obsession for technology. In the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, he tricks the league and builds a war airship using the technology he got from his enemies, like Fu Manchu for example. He also brings with him a specially designed Air Rifle that is disguised as a cane and is perfect for sniping. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Main article: James Moriarty (A Game of Shadows) Anthony Horowitz's spin-off series In the widely acclaimed book Moriarty by Anthony Horowitz, Professor Moriarty appears as the titular main protagonist. However, his identity is not revealed until the very end - he introduces himself as American detective Frederick Chase. In the book, he works alongside Detective Inspector Athelney Jones of Scotland Yard - who has appeared briefly in an actual Conan Doyle work. Athelney Jones has been indirectly humiliated by Sherlock Holmes in the past, and this has rendered him unhealthily obsessed with Holmes' methods so that he could one day be worthy of the Great Detective.

Throughout the book, the two of them are tasked with hunting down an American criminal mastermind named Clarence Devereux - whom Chase claims to have been hunting down throughout his life. They are hunted across London by Devereux's henchmen - named the Mortlake Brothers - as well as a juvenile sadist named Perry and the mostly unseen Sebastian Moran. A violent game of cat and mouse erupts between Chase and Jones, versus Devereux, right up until they are captured by Devereux and nearly killed - Devereux is planning to replace Moriarty as the criminal mastermind of London. The two men escape and Devereux is captured. After being sentenced, Chase and Jones transport the man via a Black Maria coach. However, Perry and Moran appear and ambush the coach. Chase - or Moriarty - is forced to kill Athelney Jones, a decision he admits he regrets inside. Moriarty then tells the reader about the events of The Final Problem: he was in fact on the run from Clarence Devereux - Devereux had moved from America to take Moriarty's empire all for himself.

Moriarty deeply disliked Devereux: The American's methods were sadistic, brutal and extremely violent, not at all like the calculated, subtle 'sportsmanship' that Moriarty utilizes. At the same time, he was in danger of being overthrown by Sherlock Holmes. He arranged to hunt down Sherlock Holmes, sending assassins after him throughout The Final Problem to exert pressure - to hurt, not to kill - each of which Holmes had overcome. It turns out that Moriarty had planned the events surrounding his conflict with the detective right down to their final fight. When they finally met at Reichenbach and fought, Moriarty and Holmes fell but they both escaped - Holmes remained unaware of Moriarty's survival, but Moriarty knew Holmes survived but wouldn't bother him if he thought he was dead. Then, Moriarty changed his appearance and identity to become Detective Frederick Chase. At the end of the novel, Moriarty takes Clarence Devereux prisoner and plans to interrogate the American until he exposed every location, identity and strategy in his organization so Moriarty could start another criminal empire in America. He then plans to murder Devereux in recognition of the difficulties the American put Moriarty through.

Sherlock (TV series) The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Professor Moriarty in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. In Alan Moore's series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Moriarty serves as the villain of Volume 1 where he deceives the League through Campion Bond into stealing the Cavorite that he uses to power his great warship. He engages The Doctor ( Dr. Fu Manchu ) in a sky battle over Limehouse. He is foiled when Murray smashes the container that holds the Cavorite which starts to float towards the atmosphere. Refusing to lose such a potent part of his plan, Moriarty clings to the Cavorite and subsequently drifts into outer space. In a later volume Century: 1910, he is found frozen solid in space while still clinging to the Cavorite. Tom and Jerry meet Sherlock Holmes In this cartoon movie, Moriarty is behind some diamond thefts which are done by three cats. When Tom, Jerry, Tuffy and Sherlock Holmes' client Red are following the cats while Holmes and Watson follow false clues, Red tries to hide herself and the others at her boyfriend's house.

This boyfriend actually turns out to be Moriarty, who waited for Red who got the diamond the cats have just stolen. Moriarty explains his plan: using all the mirrors placed in London, he uses the diamonds for a laser canon to burn a whole into the Tower, planning to steal the jewels. After stealing the jewels and being followed by Holmes and Watson, Moriarty finally falls into the Themse, then he's arrested along with the cats by Droopy. Like in A Game of Shadows, Moriarty's got a beard in this movie. Interestingly, he also invented a glove that fires electrical energy blasts as his weapon of choice which quite reminiscent with Iron Man's signature repulsor blasters. This characterization is voiced by Malcolm McDowell. The Real Ghostbusters Moriarty appeared in an episode of The Real Ghostbusters "Elementary, My Dear Winstin". Professor Moriarty was once an academic genius who resigned from his position at a college. He relocated to London and became a criminal mastermind responsible for at least half the crime in the city. Moriarty met his end when he and the titular detective fell to each other's deaths in a battle at Reichenbach Falls, Switzerland (though it was later revealed that Sherlock actually survived).

Even though none of the characters in the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novels were real, many fans believed them to be real, which caused ghostly versions of them to manifest. James Moriarty's ghost went to New York with the Hound of the Baskervilles in search of evil energy, which would enable him to solidify into a real person. Moriarty went to the Containment Unit and attempted to open it to absorb the evil energy of the ghosts imprisoned within it, but he retreated when he heard the Ghostbusters coming. He then went on to absorb evil energy from various items often associated with evil, such as weapons at the Museum of Crime uptown and crime novels at the New York City Public Library . He then decided to return to the Firehouse and succeed where he had failed. He opened the Unit and began to absorb the evil energy, but was foiled because the Ghostbusters had also met Sherlock Holmes and John H. Watson's ghosts. Holmes went into the Unit with Moriarty, mirroring their climatic battle. Watson then went into the Unit with the two. Moriarty was last seen in the Containment Unit covering his ears as Holmes played the Ghostbusters theme song on his violin.

Gallery Add a photo to this gallery Trivia Professor Moriarty was famous for being the villain that Sherlock Holmes fought and apparently fell to his doom with in The Final Problem - however due to a large public outlash Arthur Conan Doyle was forced to retcon these events so that both Holmes and Moriarty did not die as was originally planned but rather miraculously survived so that the series could continue. In the 1899 stage play Sherlock Holmes: A Drama in Four Acts - co-written and authorized by Conan Doyle - Moriarty is given the first name Robert. He is first referred to by the name James in the 1903 short story "The Adventure of the Empty House". Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2011) - FAQ The content of this page was created directly by users and has not been screened or verified by IMDb staff. Visit our FAQ Help to learn more FAQ How much sex, violence, and profanity are in this movie?

For detailed information about the amounts and types of (a) sex and nudity, (b) violence and gore, (c) profanity, (d) alcohol, drugs, and smoking, and (e) frightening and intense scenes in this movie, consult the IMDb Parents Guide for this movie. The Parents Guide for Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows can be found here . What is 'A Game of Shadows' about? While Dr John Watson ( Jude Law ) makes plans for his upcoming wedding, eccentric detective Sherlock Holmes ( Robert Downey Jr. ) has been keeping busy investigating a series of presumed terrorist attacks, bombings, and assassinations all over Europe. Holmes has somehow connected these to his nemesis, Professor James Moriarity ( Jared Harris ), who warns him to cease with his invetigations or he will consider the newlyweds fair game. Consequently, Holmes arranges to be on the same train to Brighton on which Watson and his bride Mary ( Kelly Reilly ) are honeymooning. True to his word, Moriarity launches an attack on the lovebirds, and Holmes is forced to toss Mary from the train to the protection of his older brother Mycroft ( Stephen Fry ).

Holmes and Watson then go to Paris to find Madame Simka Heron ( Noomi Rapace ), a gypsy whose brother Rene may be involved in helping Moriarty to instigate a world war. And so the game begins. Is "Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows" based on a book? Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is a stand-alone sequel to Sherlock Holmes (2009). The character of Sherlock Holmes was created in 1887 by Scottish writer/physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930) in the novel A Study in Scarlet and went on to appear in three more novels and 56 short stories. However, A Game of Shadows is not based on any of Doyle's books/stories but on a screenplay by American screenwriters Kieran and Michele Mulroney. Sherlock Holmes 3 has been announced but no release date has been set. Tell me more about Professor Moriarty. Professor James Moriarty is a criminal mastermind, described by Holmes as the "Napoleon of Crime".

Doyle lifted the phrase from a real Scotland Yard inspector who was referring to Adam Worth (1844-1902), a thief whose criminal career spanned over two decades. Other real world models for Moriarty were Sir Basil Zaharoff (1849-1936), a Greek arms dealer whose unscrupulous business practices earned him the nickname "the Merchant of Death," and Simon Newcomb (1835-1909) a renowned mathemetician who tried to ruin the reputations of rival scientists. By combining Worth's criminal savvy, Newcomb's mathematical genius, and Zaharoff's Machiavellian ruthlessness, Doyle created what is widely considered to be the first true example of a supervillain. Because he is depicted as Holmes' greatest enemy, Moriarty is considered to be the primary antagonist of the entire series, despite only making one physical appearance, in the story "The Final Problem" (he is mentioned reminiscently in five other stories set after the events of "The Final Problem", and operates behind-the-scenes in "The Valley of Fear" which was published after "The Final Problem" but set before it).

Other writers used him more frequently, cementing his reputation as Holmes' arch-enemy. The film's depiction of Moriarty physically resembles Worth, but overall bears the strongest similarities to Zaharoff, as he is attempting to provoke a war using advanced weaponry that he has developed. Zaharoff was privy to the latest developments in weapon technology (including the Maxim Gun which provided the real world inspiration for the film's "Little Hansel"), and during the Second Boer War, the Russo Japanese War, and World War I, he sold weapons to both sides in order to exacerbate the conflict and maximize profits. Tell me more about Mycroft Holmes. Mycroft Holmes is Sherlock Holmes' elder brother (by seven years). Possessing deductive powers exceeding even those of his younger brother, Mycroft is nonetheless incapable of performing detective work similar to that of Sherlock since he is unwilling to put in the physical effort necessary to bring cases to their conclusions. Nonetheless, if given all the facts and by the use of his superior deductive powers, he is able deduce the solution to any problem or case from the comfort of an armchair.

This has led the British and other European governments as well as royalty to frequently consult Mycroft's analytical mind on a number of key political decisions and strategies. During the last part of the escape in Heilbronn, when Holmes and Watson physically overpower the German soldiers, I got a little lost. Who does what? After the soldiers fire "Little Hansel" (an artillery cannon that apparently fires individual shots that can rip apart trees), Holmes, Watson, and Simza are knocked to the ground by the shockwave of the blast. Holmes and Watson get up seeing the soldiers approaching.

Though a little confusing because the fight happens in a matter of seconds, this is what is seen: (1) Watson grabs one soldier's rifle and twists it, throwing its owner over, (2) Holmes trades punches with another soldier using his good hand, (3) Simza knocks aside another soldier, (4) a fourth soldier swings his rifle at Holmes, who kicks him in the chest, (5) a soldier brains Simza with the butt of his rifle, knocking her down; as he aims his rifle, Watson shoots and kills him with a pistol, (6) Holmes knocks out another soldier as another cannonball hits nearby, forcing him to grab onto a nearby tree, (7) another soldier advances on Holmes, who successfully dodges a shot fired at point-blank range (missing and hitting the tree instead); Holmes grabs the soldier's rifle, ejects the round, and knocks him out then chambers a new round in a matter of seconds, passes the rifle to Watson, who shoots and wounds Moran as Moran crests a rise, and (8) as the party escapes on the train, Moran comes to his senses, steadies his breathing, aims his rifle, and picks off the unlucky gypsy bringing up the back of the escapees.

How does the movie end? Watson walks out on the terrace just in time to see both Holmes and Moriarity go over the railing together and tumble into the icy waters of Reichenbach Falls. Following Holmes' funeral, John and Mary prepare to leave on their belated honeymoon, and Watson finishes writing the story of his last case with Holmes. He types 'The End' just as Mary brings in a parcel delivered in the post. Opening it, Watson finds Mycroft's breathing apparatus and begins to question its meaning. In the final scene, as John runs after Mary to find the delivery man, Holmes reveals himself as cleverly concealed on a lounge chair. He sits at Watson's typewriter and adds a question mark after 'The End.' Sherlockian.Net: Professor Moriarty Sherlockian.Net: Professor Moriarty He is the Napoleon of crime, Watson . . . Sherlock Holmes's arch-enemy is thought to have been Professor James Moriarty (whose brother was also named James Moriarty). Yes, there is something odd about the chronology of the two stories in which he figures, "The Final Problem" and The Valley of Fear.

And yes, he seems to have been involved in only two of the sixty published cases — which hardly justifies the popular impression (based perhaps on films and parodies) that Holmes and Moriarty duelled throughout their long careers. The drawing at right is by Sidney Paget, an illustration for the original publication of "The Final Problem" in 1893. Note the spelling: Moriarty. Not Moriarity, not Moriaty, not Morrity, not even, as one parodist rendered it, Arty Morty! The Napoleon of Crime ~3 users here now For discussions and appreciation of the greatest old-fashioned villain, James Moriarty. Professor James Moriarty is a fictional character in novels about the legendary detective Sherlock Holmes , written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle . Moriarty is considered Holmes's nemesis and is a criminal mastermind, whom Holmes describes as the "Napoleon of crime." There have been many adaptations of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and many depictions of Moriarty.

Some of the more famous ones: Professor Ratigan, voiced by Vincent Price, in Disney's animated The Great Mouse Detective Orson Wells' vocal talents in the 1950s radio series The holodeck simulation version of the professor, played by Daniel Davis, in two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation Eric Porter's portrayal in the popular Sherlock Holmes TV show (1984), in which Jeremy Brett played the detective Jared Harris' portrayal in the 2011 Guy Ritchie movie Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows Andrew Scott's BAFTA-winning performance in the BBC television show Sherlock. Content about any and all depictions are welcome and encouraged. Related subreddits: /r/Holmes has everything related to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's legendary novels. /r/Sherlock is for things related more directly to the modernized BBC show. For things related to Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays the titular character in BBC's Sherlock, check out /r/Cumberbitches . For things related to Martin Freeman, who plays Dr John Watson in BBC's Sherlock, check out /r/MartinFreeman .

Feel free to crosspost pictures of any incarnation of Moriarty to /r/LadyBoners and /r/BritishLadyBoners -- because evil and brainy is the new sexy! created by [deleted]a community for 7 years Sherlock Holmes - All The Tropes We have many pages linking to disambiguation lists instead of to the articles they should point to. (How many? Over Forty-Nine Thousand! ) If you have time, please clean up a page or two. Sherlock Holmes Here dwell together still two men of note Who never lived and so can never die: How very near they seem, yet how remote That age before the world went all awry. But still the game's afoot for those with ears Attuned to catch the distant view-halloo: England is England yet, for all our fears— Only those things the heart believes are true. A yellow fog swirls past the window-pane As night descends upon this fabled street: A lonely hansom splashes through the rain, The ghostly gas lamps fail at twenty feet. Here, though the world explode, these two survive, And it is always eighteen ninety-five.

—"221B", Vincent Starrett Holmes had a number of well-known catch phrases : " When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth ", "The game's afoot" (itself a quote from Shakespeare 's Henry V ), " The Plot Thickens ", and, most famously, "Elementary, my dear Watson" (which Holmes never actually said in any of Doyle's stories). A less known Catch Phrase would be "It is simplicity in itself," which appears to be the basis for "Elementary, my dear Watson." Doyle admitted that he based the character of Holmes on Dr. Joseph Bell, one of his professors from University, and Edgar Allan Poe 's C. Auguste Dupin. This is lampshaded in a rather blunt statement made by Holmes within the story in which he is originally introduced ("A Study In Scarlet"), "Now, in my opinion, Dupin was a very inferior fellow. That trick of his of breaking in on his friends' thoughts with an apropos remark after a quarter of an hour's silence is really very showy and superficial.

He had some analytical genius, no doubt; but he was by no means such a phenomenon as Poe appeared to imagine." (Though Holmes isn't above performing this precise feat on Watson in later stories, to show that he's perfectly capable of doing it--he just considers it more showy than regularly useful.) Throughout the stories only one person ever refers to Holmes as "Sherlock", and that's his brother. Nearly everyone else, even Watson, calls him "Holmes" or "Mister Holmes". This is normal for Victorian and Edwardian England; at the time, you'd only use a first name to address family members, romantic partners (and you had to be all but engaged), junior servants, or children. [2] One minor character in "The Sign of Four" refers to him as "Mister Sherlock", which in context implied that he'd known Holmes since boyhood. Additionally, this is updated and played with in the 2011 Ritchie sequel, where Mycroft calls his brother " Sherly " on a number of occasions.

In the modern US, however, the rules are very different; the only people you're not supposed to be on a first-name basis with are seniors whom you don't know well, and in fact refusing to use first names can paint you as a snobbish, sneering Jerkass . As a result, a hundred years after his death and on the far side of an ocean, the Great Detective is referred to by his first name far more often than he was in his "lifetime". Holmes fans in Britain are called "Holmesians", in America "Sherlockians". Other recurring characters in the Holmes stories were: Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard. Initially he was mildly antagonistic as he disapproved of Holmes's interference in police matters, but he later came to respect and rely on the detective. Holmes would usually allow -- or insist -- that Lestrade take full credit for cases that Holmes had solved. Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's Aloof Big Brother . Mycroft's role varied from time to time, but he was generally Always Someone Better to Holmes.

Even Sherlock acknowledged that Mycroft's mind was sharper than his own, but his skills were largely wasted due to his exceptional sloth : almost nothing piqued Mycroft's interest enough to lure him out of the familiar surroundings of his favorite private club. Mycroft was some sort of government functionary, whose official duties were limited, but "In certain cases, Mycroft is the British Government." Professor James Moriarty, Holmes's personal Evil Counterpart ; a mathematician and criminal mastermind whom Holmes described as "the Napoleon of Crime". Moriarty was killed (as, apparently, was Holmes, though he turned out to be Not Quite Dead ) in "The Final Problem", his introductory story, though Conan Doyle went on to reuse Moriarty in The Valley of Fear, a novel whose action takes place before that of "The Final Problem." Moriarty's henchman, Colonel Sebastian Moran, is the villain of The Adventure of the Empty House and has been used in many post-Doyle Holmes stories. Mrs. Hudson, Holmes's disapproving landlady. Mary Watson (nee Morstan), Watson's fiancee and later wife. The Baker Street Irregulars, a gang of street children who gather information for Holmes.

See Sherlock Holmes (novel) for a list of canonical Sherlock Holmes works written by Arthur Conan Doyle and the associated tropes. Adaptations of Sherlock Holmes Fan Fic[ edit | hide ] A common urban legend is that the fact that Sherlock Holmes fanfics are so common made the writers of Star Trek: The Next Generation believe the character, as well as his nemesis Professor Moriarty, were in the public domain when they made the episode "Elementary, My Dear Data", only to receive an angry letter from the Doyle estate. This is, unfortunately, not supported by the facts, but it makes a good story -- students of urban legends will, of course, recognize some slight resemblance between this and the Neiman-Marcus Red Velvet Cake legend. Sherlock Holmes was arguably one of the first franchises in the modern era to become almost as famous for its fanfiction as for its fiction. Holmes captured the imagination of many writers, and spawned a considerable amount of unauthorized sequels or guest appearances -- especially across the Atlantic, as the state of international copyright enforcement was largely nonexistent at the time.

According to Victorian-literature expert Jess Nevins, it was fairly common for penny-dreadful writers to write stories in which Sherlock Holmes is immediately murdered and a plucky young protagonist has to figure out who did it. Also, stories of the French character Arsène Lupin began as a Holmes copycat, but subsequently featured a renamed (by order of Conan Doyle's lawyers) and badly-written version of Holmes himself. Film[ edit | hide ] A number of films were made (Holmes has appeared in more films than any other single fictional character), some of which took a number of liberties with the story: Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce starred as Holmes and Watson in a popular series of film adaptations in the 1930s and 1940s; the last two were anachronistically set in the then present-day era, pitting Holmes and Watson against Nazi spies. Bruce's portrayal of Watson as a bumbling incompetent rather than the original ladykilling man of action helped begin a long chain of similar Adaptation Decay .

In the 1937 German comedy adventure Der Mann, der Sherlock Holmes war (The Man Who Was Sherlock Holmes), two unsuccessful private detectives (Hans Albers and Heinz Rühmann) decide to drum up interest by dressing up as Holmes and Watson. They are met with great deference everywhere, solve the theft of valuable stamps, but are put on trial for impersonation, where they insist that they told everybody that they weren't Holmes and Watson. Conan Doyle is shown laughing his head off in the courtroom audience and mentioning that Holmes and Watson are fictional characters he invented, which means the movie must be set before 1930. The 1970 film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes , directed by Billy Wilder. In 1975, Gene Wilder made his directorial debut with The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes Smarter Brother . It follows Sherlock's (self-proclaimed) smarter younger brother Siegerson, who attempts to thwart Moriarty on his own. 1978's The Hound of the Baskervilles starring Dudley Moore and Peter Cook is one of the worst films ever made.

Available to watch on Netflix Watch Instantly, it is a stunningly bad comedy with the entire soundtrack consisting of Moore idly noodling on a piano. 1979, Murder By Decree starring Christopher Plummer as Holmes and James Mason as (a Non-Flanderized) Watson on Jack the Ripper case. The basis for the plot was the book Jack the Ripper: The Final Solution By Stephen Knight, same book that would be the basis for Alan Moore's From Hell some years later. It was seen by some as a Darker and Edgier Sherlock Holmes movie but, given the subject matter, it's understandable. This was the second time Holmes and the Ripper met, the first time was in the 1966 movie A Study in Terror. In the 1985 Levinson/Spielberg/Columbus movie Young Sherlock Holmes , a teenaged Holmes and Watson meet at a boarding school decades prior to their adult companionship.

(Unusual in that it began with a disclaimer explaining that it was a " What If " story.) In the 1988 movie Without a Clue the Holmes/Watson roles are reversed, with Watson as the real detective and Holmes as an alcoholic actor hired by Watson as his public front. In perhaps the most unusual adaptation, there is the 1971 movie They Might Be Giants (from which the band took its name), which starred George C. Scott as a man who thought he was Sherlock Holmes, and Joanne Woodward as his psychiatrist, whose name was Watson. The film itself took its name from a line in Don Quixote. And a large number of made-for-TV-movies, starring such actors as Tom Baker, Larry Hagman, Roger Moore, Richard Roxbourgh, Ruper Everett, and Matt Frewer. The 1985 Pilot Movie TV movie The Return of Sherlock Holmes had Michael Pennington as the great detective, thawed out in modern times by a female descendant of Watson. 2003 saw an adaptation of The Hound of the Baskervilles which played up Holmes's addiction. Guy Ritchie filmed a Sherlock Holmes movie with Robert Downey, Jr. .

as Holmes and Jude Law as Watson, released on Christmas Day 2009. Response to the trailer, which basically strung the comedic moments together to make it look more like a spoof than an actual Holmes story, was... controversial... in fandom. The movie received mostly positive reviews, and critics praised Downey Jr's portrayal as the detective (for which he won a Golden Globe) and the chemistry between him and Law. And it was a box-office hit. A sequel to this film, titled Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, came to theaters in December 2011 with Jared Harris as Professor Moriarty and Stephen Fry as Mycroft Holmes. The Asylum released Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes directly to DVD in 2010 to piggyback on the Ritchie film. Starring Ben Syder as Holmes and Gareth David-Lloyd as Watson. It's steampunk and involves dinosaurs.

Literature not written by Arthur Conan Doyle[ edit | hide ] Adrian Conan Doyle (son of Arthur Conan Doyle) and John Dickson Carr (Doyle's biographer and friend) wrote a series of Short Stories collected under the name 'The Exploits of Sherlock Holmes', and was supposed to be the accounts of the cases that Watson mentioned but never made it to the original 56 short stories. Some consider it canon, for being written by the Author's son, and treat it as the tenth volume of Sherlock Holmes canon, but many more don't for the obvious fact that it wasn't written or approved by Arthur Conan Doyle (it was written and published after his death) and it was cowritten by an unrelated author. Sequels were expected but never produced, mainly because the authors got in a dispute over who wrote what. Nicholas Meyer's novel (later adapted to film), The Seven Percent Solution proposed that the Moriarty stories were complete fictions invented by Watson to cover for Holmes's recovery from cocaine addiction.

(This was to explain the canon's apparent contradiction of Moriarty dying in the story that introduced him, yet figuring in other prequel stories.) In the story, Moriarty is revealed as Holmes's childhood maths tutor, whom Holmes had cast as a criminal in his drug-induced delirium. The story ends with a departing Holmes suggesting that Watson explain his absence to the readers by telling them he'd been murdered by his math tutor. Laurie R. King's Mary Russell series takes place in the 1910s-20s. Robert L. Fish's ridiculously pun-packed Schlock Homes stories...where to begin... Some titles of stories: "The Adventure of the Printer's Inc.", "The Adventure of the Spectacled Band" (there is a Holmes adventure of the speckled band), "The Adventure of the Snared Drummer", "The Adventure of the Perforated Ulster", "The Adventure of the Dog in the Knight", "The Adventure of the Artist's Mottle" Watney's first paragraph of "The Adventure of the Missing Three-Quarters": "My notes for the early part of the year '65 contain several instances of more than passing interest for those who follow the adventures of my friend Mr.

Schlock Homes. There was, for example, his brilliant solution to the mysterious gunning down of a retired boilermaker, a case which I find listed as The Adventure of the Shot and the Bier; and there is also reference to the intriguing business of the hitchhiking young actress, noted in my journal as The Adventure of the Ingenue's Thumb." (There's a Holmes adventure of the engineer's thumb.) The Enola Holmes series by Nancy Springer, which depicts the adventures of the much younger sister of Sherlock. This series is a cut above others in that on top of each mystery, the overall plot arc is of the eventual reconciliation of the Holmes siblings as Enola finds that she is a match for her brother in every way for her age. For his part, a spot-on depicted Sherlock learns to admire his brilliant sister as a professional colleague in an utterly believable way. Michael Chabon 's 2004 novella The Final Solution, in which Holmes (never named directly, but it is clearly him), a 90ish old man living in country retirement as a beekeeper, tries to locate a German Jewish boy's stolen parrot.

In 2010 Andrew Lane wrote Death Cloud, which chronicles a fourteen year-old Holmes's first murder case. It stands to be the only teen novel endorsed by the Doyle Estate. Basil of Baker Street, later adapted by Disney as The Great Mouse Detective . A Funny Animal version of the mythos, and many a child's first exposure to Sherlock Holmes. Basil's name is an obvious Shout-Out to Basil Rathbone. Rathbone himself even has a vocal cameo (albeit one well after his death) as Holmes himself. Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street, a popular tongue-in-cheek "biography" of Sherlock Holmes written in 1962 by W.S. Baring-Gould, has been the source of many interesting theories about Holmes, some of which are often assumed to be canon (even in this very entry).

These include the idea that the King of Bohemia was Edward VII; that Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler became lovers in Montenegro during the time Holmes was hiding from Moran, and that Irene returned to New Jersey to bear his child, a boy later known as Nero Wolfe [3] ; that Holmes in his twenties was a stage actor in a company that toured America; that he worked on the Jack the Ripper case; that Watson had three wives; that Holmes's bee-keeping in later years was intended as a way of producing royal jelly, then thought of as a "fountain of youth"; and that Holmes died in the 1950s after spending the war years - when he would have been roughly 90 years old - fighting Nazis. In The Adventure of Sherlock Holmes Smarter Brother , the title character, Siegerson, is named for Baring-Gould's Holmes pere. As a way of freeing up Sherlock and Mycroft for their various occupations while still ensuring they were members of the "right" class, Baring-Gould invented Sherringford, the eldest--and smartest--brother, who stayed home in Yorkshire to take care of the responsibilities of a country squire.

Sherringford was Holmes's original name in Doyle's first draft of A Study in Scarlet. The Hound of the Durbervilles by Kim Newman focuses on Professor Moriarty and his subordinate, Sebastian Moran, as they share a series of adventures that oddly echo Holmes's famous cases and have them meeting numerous other characters from Victorian and Edwardian fiction . The last story in the collection, "The Problem of the Final Adventure", retells "The Final Problem" from Moran's point of view. Trouble in Bugland: A Collection of Inspector Mantis Mysteries is Sherlock Holmes in "Bugland," where everyone is an insect. Holmes is Inspector Mantis, a praying mantis, and Watson is Doctor Hopper. Live Action TV[ edit | hide ] Sherlock Holmes first appeared on television in 1937. 1951 saw the first regular TV series based on Holmes' exploits, airing on the BBC with Alan Wheatley as Holmes. A syndicated 1950s TV series, filmed in France, starring Ronald Howard and Marion Crawford. A series of adaptations starring Peter Cushing in the 1960s.

Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, a 24-part series from 1979 with Geoffrey Whitehead. Sherlock Holmes , produced by Granada Television (ITV), starring Jeremy Brett , David Burke, and Edward Hardwicke. Ran from 1984 to 1994, and is generally considered to be most faithful to Conan Doyle's original vision of the character. Series one and two ran under then name The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, three and four The Return of Sherlock Holmes, five The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes, and six The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. Five feature length episodes were made and released between series, two based on the novels The Sign of Four and The Hound of the Baskervilles, three based on short stories turned into Expanded Adaptation . The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson [1] -- no relationship to the above. A Russian series notable for not flanderizing Watson into an idiot, being a generally faithful Adaptation Distillation and for the fact that the actor playing Holmes got an Order of the British Empire for his portrayal.

Murder Rooms: The Dark Origins of Sherlock Holmes is a BBC series which featured not Holmes and Watson, but instead had the young Arthur Conan Doyle himself in the Watson role and expounded on the theory that the character of Holmes was a thinly-veiled stand-in for one of Doyle's medical school teachers, Professor Joseph Bell. Sherlock , a BBC miniseries beginning July 2010. Created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss , the series stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman as Dr John Watson in a 21st-century Setting Update of the original stories. The show has been a critical and commercial smash hit both in the UK and abroad and cleaned up at the 2011 BAFTAs , including wins for Best Supporting Actor (Freeman) and Best Drama Series. The Canadian mystery series The Adventures of Shirley Holmes was about the great-grandniece of Sherlock Holmes solving crimes. House MD owes quite a bit to Sherlock Holmes.

Besides the acknowledged parallels -- Greg House/Sherlock Holmes and James Wilson/John Watson -- there are a number of references and running jokes that pay homage to Sherlock Holmes, such as House's house number 221B (Baker Street), the name of the man in "No Reason" who shoots House, named as "Moriarty" in some documentation (although never onscreen) , and the fact that the very first patient that he treats in the pilot episode is a woman named "Adler". Also, in the episode "Whac-a-Mole", House diagnoses the patient and seals his diagnosis in an envelope, with the words "The Game is a itchy foot." written on it. This is a blatant reference to Holmes. Radio[ edit | hide ] There was also a series of BBC radio adaptations starring Clive Merrison as Holmes. Merrison's performance has some marked similarities to Brett's; he is the only actor to have appeared in adaptations of all the original stories, as well as new pastiches. A number of radio adaptations, both adaptations and original stories, starring Nigel Bruce as Watson and first Basil Rathbone and then Tom Conway as Holmes.

(Rathbone and Bruce were associated with the roles from a long-running film series. Several available here [2] ) Big Finish , most famous for their extensive range of Doctor Who audio plays , have been producing a series of Sherlock Holmes dramas. There are four in the series so far: one is an adaptation of a canonical story, one is set during Holmes' elderly years after the passing of Dr. Watson, one is a metafictional tale in which Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Professor Moriarty conspire against Holmes, and the most recent installment pits Holmes against Jack the Ripper . The Great Detective is played by Roger Llewellyn and Nicholas Briggs. Theatre[ edit | hide ] Sherlock Holmes first appeared on-stage in a 1899 play written by and starring William Gillette. Simply titled Sherlock Holmes , it featured an original plot.

Years later, Orson Welles would adapt the play for The Mercury Radio Theater with the explanation that, "It is not enough to say that William Gillette looks like Sherlock Holmes: Sherlock Holmes looks exactly like William Gillette." It was Gillette, and not Doyle, who popularized most of the visual tropes associated with the character to this day such as the deerstalker cap, the distinctive pipe and riding cloak. His iconic attire was originally depicted by Sidney Paget, who illustrated the stories for their initial publication in Strand Magazine, but he only put Holmes in them in appropriate situations: when the story took him out of London, and into the countryside. Starting in 1988, Jeremy Brett and his second Watson, Edward Hardwicke, starred in a stage production titled The Secret of Sherlock Holmes . It was written by Jeremy Paul, who scripted many episodes of the Granada Television series. Video Games[ edit | hide ] Three Sherlock Holmes games were released on a Famicom, but none of them outside Japan. Two were your typical adventure games solving clues. The third one was an action-adventure game which wasn't received well.

Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective, was released for PC, TurboDuo, CTDV and Sega CD in the early '90s, as part of the Full Motion Video craze that gripped gaming after the introduction of the CD-ROM format. One of the last Interactive Fiction games produced by Infocom was 1988's Sherlock: The Riddle of the Crown Jewels, in which the player takes the role of Watson. Electronic Arts' The Lost Files of Sherlock Holmes, sadly limited to two adventures (The Case of the Serrated Scalpel and The Case of the Rose Tattoo) were released in the 1990s, making use of the Literary Agent Hypothesis to portray two Holmes cases considered "too hot to show" . Since 2002, the company Frogwares has been developing a series of Sherlock Holmes puzzle/adventure games based off the original books as well as including various crossovers with other series. As of 2010, the series includes: Sherlock Holmes: The Mystery of the Mummy Sherlock Holmes: The Case of the Silver Earring Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened - A crossover with the Cthulhu Mythos Sherlock Holmes Versus Arsene Lupin

Question: Whom did 'Sherlock Holmes' describe as "The Napoleon of crime"?
Answer: PROFESSOR MORIARTY